Books - May 2009

Reviewed This Month: • The Laws of Harmony • Seven Cities of Mud • The First Tortilla • In Beauty I Walk • Inherited Sins • Wild Sorrow • Joy of the Birds • Kenneth Milton Chapman: A Life Dedicated to Indian Arts and Artists

Guest Review by Wolf Schneider

Fiction
The Laws of Harmony
By Judith Ryan Hendricks
Harper Paperbacks
496 pages, paperback, $14.99

Set in New Mexico and on an island off the coast of Seattle, The Laws of Harmony, by Santa Fe-based novelist Judith Ryan Hendricks, is a compelling pastiche of literary fiction. The novel has romance, plenty of self-discovery, and some culinary how-to, which makes it similar to Hendricks’s previous novel, the best-selling Bread Alone, though The Laws of Harmony is even more fully developed.

In the vein of authors Jo-Ann Mapson and Sara Davidson, Hendricks centers The Laws of Harmony on an independent, thirtysomething female who finds solace in friendship and nature, but is tripped up by her failed romantic liaisons. Protagonist Sunny Cooper grew up on a Taos commune, and at the start of the novel is doing voice-overs and catering in Albuquerque, where she lives with her fiancé, Michael, an Internet entrepreneur. Or so he says. It’s a good life—or was, before Michael began to drift away. Sunny buys green-chile bread at Montoya’s Pandería, listens to the Dixie Chicks, and bakes suppers
of Spanish pie. Then Michael appears to die in a car accident, and Sunny finds out that their life together wasn’t what she thought it was.

She flees—all the way to the fictional town of Harmony, on San Miguel Island, in Washington.
Hendricks is a bright light on the New Mexico literary scene. With carefully constructed prose, she moves the narrative forward as, from the perspective of a faraway locale, Sunny comes to terms with her
past, including her relationship with her mother. Sunny remembers
New Mexico’s “red mesas and purple mountains; that trick of the thin, bright air that makes everything appear closer and smaller.” But now, in Washington, she’s shopping at farm stands offering delicate blue-green eggs, and “the roadsides are thick with the spring growth of yarrow and Queen Anne’s lace about to bloom, tufts of purple clover and rambling wild sweet pea vines.”

There are potential romantic interests here, too, like the looker who asks her to describe the taste of a merlot. She gamely attempts, “I guess I’d call it intense and tannic but amusingly pretentious.” His appraisal? “Edgy and unsophisticated and annoyingly underdeveloped.” Are they talking about wine or each other?

Brimming with clever dialogue and complex relationships, The Laws
of Harmony is an emboldening tale of one woman’s journey to take
responsibility for herself, make peace with her upbringing, and learn what makes a relationship worthwhile. Then there’s the nine-years-younger guy Sunny gets involved with, who’s about to sail off to Hawaii. Well, hey, hope springs eternal, doesn’t it? And isn’t that what keeps us going?

Wolf Schneider has been editor in chief of the Santa Fean, editor of Living West, and consulting editor of Southwest Art.

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Book Briefs by Ashley M. Biggers

Historical Fiction
Seven Cities of Mud
By Florence B. Weinberg
Twilight Times Books
260 pages, paperback, $16.95

Seven Cities of Mud dramatizes the collision between the Pueblo Indians and Spanish explorers and missionaries in 16th-century New Mexico. This tumultuous period comes to life through the stories of Franciscan Fray Agustín, a Spanish missionary on a quest to convert the Pueblo Indians to Christianity, and Poli, a Pueblo widow who becomes his guide. Still in search of the wealth once promised by the fabled Seven Cities of Gold sought by Coronado—and not content to accept the seven cities of mud that actually existed—the Spanish soldiers take
charge and conflict ensues, with tragic consequences. Anyone with an interest in the Spanish exploration of this area and the resulting clash of cultures will enjoy this plot-driven novel. Author Florence B. Weinberg is a native New Mexican from Alamogordo who currently lives in San Antonio, Texas. Seven Cities of Mud was a Historical Fiction finalist for the 2008 New Mexico Book Awards.

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Children
The First Tortilla: A Bilingual Story
By Rudolfo Anaya, Illustrated by Amy Córdova, Spanish Translation by Enrique R. Lamadrid
University of New Mexico Press
32 pages, hardcover, $16.95

In this children’s story, iconic New Mexican author and gifted storyteller Rudolfo Anaya reinterprets an ancient Aztec legend about the gift of corn. In the modern tale, Jade, a young girl, courageously ventures from her home to pay tribute to the angered Mountain Spirit, who has refused to bestow rain on the ungrateful villagers’ fields. Jade follows the Mountain Spirit’s messenger, a blue hummingbird, up the treacherous path to the volcano’s mouth, where she speaks with the Spirit. In exchange for her gratitude, the Mountain Spirit gives not only the rain Jade seeks, but kernels of corn as well. When she returns to her village, Jade plants the corn, and from its kernels makes the first tortilla. This story, in which we learn that bravery and creativity can benefit the community, is worth sharing with your young reader. The tale is accompanied by vibrant images, inspired by Mexican folk art, by Taos-based illustrator Amy Córdova, who previously collaborated with Anaya on the children’s story The Santero’s Miracle (UNM Press, 2004). The First Tortilla is recommended for children up to seven years old.

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Native American
In Beauty I Walk: Literary Roots of Native American Writing
By Jarold Ramsey and Lori Burlingame
University of New Mexico Press
416 pages, paperback, $27.95

In this anthology, editors Jarold Ramsey and Lori Burlingame, both professors of Native American literature, have collected texts from what they call the “first generation” of Native American writers: those who recorded traditional narratives, songs, and ceremonies. The selections come from a range of cultures, from Plains tribes to Pueblos, and encompass a variety of narratives, from creation myths to stories about how to live in the world. The editors’ notes about the connections between the traditional texts and the work of modern Native American authors like Leslie Marmon Silko and N. Scott Momaday are one of this collection’s strengths. This type of literature can be enigmatic and challenging to read for the non-Native, due to the differences in European and Native American storytelling traditions. But the very unfamiliarity that many of us will experience in reading this book will make it all the more worthwhile.

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Fiction
Inherited Sins
By Paula Paul
University of New Mexico Press
245 pages, paperback, $18.95

Told through diary entries, the novel Inherited Sins is the story of Johnnie Marie Martin, a woman haunted by her past, and preacher Dan Fletcher, who tries to save himself and his flock from sin. As her forbidden relationship with Fletcher unfolds, Martin reveals her secrets: sexual abuse by her father, and the desperate measures she took to protect her own daughter. In this poignant story, the frailties and immoralities of one generation are passed on to the next; as Martin’s daughter notes in the prologue, “The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children . . . the web of the past entwines itself around me, and I begin to see how all that I am is woven in with Mama’s life and, yes, Dan Fletcher’s, too, in a pattern that was determined before I was born.” In her 23rd novel, Paula Paul evokes compassion for her characters’ humanity as only a gifted storyteller can. Her writing is at times blunt, at times lyrical, and always honest. The longtime Albuquerque resident grew up in Texas, where this story, set in the 1940s, takes place.

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Mystery
Wild Sorrow: A Wild Mystery
By Sandi Ault
Berkley Hardcover
304 pages, hardcover, $24.95

The speed with which Sandi Ault is publishing is nearly as frenetic as her fast-paced novels—this is the third book in her Wild series to be released in little more than two years, following Wild Indigo (2007) and Wild Inferno(2008). In Wild Sorrow, Bureau of Land Management agent Jamaica Wild is tracking a wounded mountain lion near Taos when she’s forced to take refuge for the night in an abandoned Indian school. Inside, she finds the corpse of one of the school’s former teachers. In the following days, Wild and her wolf companion, Mountain, continue to track the lion, only to learn that the unidentified killer may be tracking them. Ault’s talents go far beyond devising a suspense-driven plot; she layers this enjoyable tale with her considerable knowledge of Native American customs and history. I’m not the first to say it, nor will I be the last: Fans of Nevada Barr and Tony Hillerman will be enthralled with this series. Jamaica Wild shares such qualities as no-nonsense determination and occasional vulnerability with Barr’s protagonist, Anna Pigeon, and Ault’s dedication to preserving and respecting native cultures in her fictionalized version of Taos Pueblo is reminiscent of Hillerman’s work. If you aren’t yet a fan of this former New Mexico author, who now lives in Colorado, you should be.

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Historical Fiction
Joy of the Birds
By Gale Cooper
AuthorHouse
664 pages, paperback, $25.99

The high drama of the Lincoln County War comes to life in Joy of the Birds. Of course, outlaw and (as author Gale Cooper suggests) charismatic hero Billy Bonney, a.k.a. Billy the Kid, is central to the skirmish, riling up politicians and lawmen alike. The epic novel unfolds slowly as the Kid confronts his fears and lives to the fullest, including falling in love with Paulita Maxwell, a rich heiress—a love that Cooper believes motivated the Kid to make his foolhardy return to Fort Sumner, where he was killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett. The book has been a labor of love for Cooper. On a whim, she picked up a copy of Garrett’s famous (though most likely biased) Authentic Life of Billy the Kid and, as she read it, the story for Joy of the Birds emerged. She left her Beverly Hills psychiatry practice, in which she specialized as a consultant in murder investigations, moved to Sandía Park, and spent the next decade writing Joy of the Birds. This expertly researched tale—Cooper provides a 70-page bibliography—is told as only someone with true insight into the complexity of the human mind can.

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Biography
Kenneth Milton Chapman: A Life Dedicated to Indian Arts and Artists
By Janet Chapman and Karen Barrie
University of New Mexico Press
370 pages, hardcover, $34.95

Kenneth Milton Chapman is best known for being a leading force in the revitalization of Pueblo pottery in the 1920s, an effort that led to the first Indian Fair (now the world-famous Santa Fe Indian Market); and for cofounding the pottery collection of the Indian Arts Fund. Among his other artistic and anthropological contributions, Chapman was recognized during his lifetime as the sole Anglo authority on the design of Pueblo pottery, and was a founding staff member of several Santa Fe museums. His biographers—his grandniece Janet Chapman, a Tijeras resident; and Karen Barrie, a relative by marriage—trace Chapman’s roots from Indiana to the streets of Santa Fe, where he first earned his living selling watercolors to tourists. In fact, an article by the authors, “Kenneth Chapman: Curator’s Passion Brings Pueblo Art to Santa Fe,” published in the November 1999 issue of New Mexico Magazine, galvanized this biography, which is based on “Chap’s” previously unpublished memoirs and correspondence, and interviews with his family and colleagues. This engaging personal history will give you fresh insight into the life of one of the lesser-known (outside New Mexico) early 20th-century champions of Native art.

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